Smart Alerts
Contextual alarming that cuts across silos of information is Smart Alarming
Problem
As a building operator or contractor, how many times have you been woken up in the middle of the night or arrived at work in the morning only to be greeted by a long list of alarms. Your stomach sinks, coffee goes cold and you begin the painful task of scrolling through both building automation and energy management silos only to find alarms filled with messages like:
Chiller-1 Fault
CHWP-1 Fault
MSSB-1 Excessive consumption
Next alarm with little meaning or context…
The technician who setup the alarms knows what they mean, how to address, and how to solve them. Unfortunately, that technician has long left the company, leaving the building operator and new technician to inefficiently use their time trying to diagnose and fault find. Many hours later the technician diagnoses the problem but by this stage the building operator and occupants are already complaining.
When limited information can be used to generate alarms, there is limited ability to add context so that a user can interpret what the alarm means. The higher the alarm count, the higher the frustration levels and the more alarms begin to become ignored. Once alarms begin to be ignored, they can become dangerous. Once they become dangerous they become expensive. When alarms are ignored and go unnoticed, the results can be more catastrophic and physically damaging. Frequent alarms cause frustrated users to treat them as noise and nuisance rather than actionable alerts.
Effects
Failure of mechanical plant can be one of the biggest concerns of a building operator or owner. When a building is home to people and equipment that is sensitive to temperature, if any of the buildings plant fails the impact for a building owner can be much higher than simply repairing the failed piece of plant and angry tenants. The end result can include:
- Higher than expected energy costs
- Expensive repair costs
Loss in rent as tenants move out - Loss of credibility in the market leading to;Long vacancy periods
- Lower asset value
- Risk legal action is taken to recover costs of spoilt experiments, medicines or food stocks
Examples of the direct costs can be quantified – see figure 1 below. However, the indirect costs are usually more significant and harder to quantify. For example; if a laboratory loses conditions for an extended duration because chiller alarms are being ignored, a whole experiment or laboratory of experiments could be lost. Experiments can be tracked and monitored over years, multiple laboratories or even passed on from scientist to scientist. The costs of losing these experiments can extremely be substantial.
Direct Costs
Fault | Action Taken | Costs |
|---|---|---|
Unnoticed peak demand costs plus increased energy consumption | No action taken due to lack of awareness | Increased energy costs by ~15% |
Chiller compressor failure | Cost of compressor, labor and loss of conditions in building | Thousands |
Indirect Costs
Fault | Action Taken | Costs |
|---|---|---|
Laboratory experiments over temperature. Years of ongoing research ruined | No action taken due to lack of awareness | Thousands |
Loss in rent as frustrated tenants move out
Loss of credibility in the market leading to Long vacancy periods Lower asset value Legal fees | Loss in rent as frustrated tenants move out
Loss of credibility in the market leading to; Long vacancy periods Lower asset value Legal fees | Thousands |
Need & Solution
To avoid these costs and catastrophic outcomes there is a need for early intervention and smarter alarming with context. Combining information from a Building Management System (BMS) and Energy Management System (EMS) enables smarter alarming with context. By having smarter alarming with context, what used to be nuisance and noise becomes an informative notification, advising what has occurred and what steps must now be taken to rectify the issue. What used to be an ignored or nuisance alarm with message stating:
“Chiller-1 Fault”
Can become a useful notification advising problem and potential solution:
“Chiller Plant Performance Alert”
Chiller 1 running at 100% and consuming excessive energy. Bypass valve closed with high water flow through vessel and low heat transfer. Air handling units starved of chilled water causing space temperatures inside the building to increase. Most likely chiller bypass valve actuator failed or valve jammed in open position. Call mechanical technician immediately. Click here to check Energy and Trend-log analysis report Optergy/Chiller_1_report
Benefits
This is a smarter more useful alarming system less likely to be ignored by users. Once a system is capable of outputting smarter alarms with context by email, SMS or push notification to a mobile phone they can be actioned much faster reducing costs from figure 1, to a simple callout with replacement part:
Fault | Action Taken | Costs |
|---|---|---|
Chiller Plant Performance Alert | Alarm for mechanical plant showing overuse in the chiller plant. Compressor overload. Service callout, found bypass valve actuator faulty. Replaced actuator and returned plant to normal operation within few hours. Once off rectification cost | Hundreds |
Optergy is a system that can be installed as a combined BMS & EMS solution or can add functionality to an existing BACnet BMS system. Using a common web browser Optergy can generate alarms, pop up notifications, email alarms, smart phone push notifications and SMS. Smart alarms can be sent to specific users or groups during specific time periods. A unique feature of Optergy software is its ability to escalate alarms to a different user(s) if an alarm goes unanswered. This ensures that critical alarms will never go un-actioned.
